Music festival employees’ ableism as experienced by participants with disabilities

Being disabled or having a health problem is the third most common reason for not participating in arts events. Ableist attitudes are common but have hardly been studied in the festival context. We focus on this research gap, concentrating on festival employees’ ableism. The introductory quantitative analysis demonstrates that persons with disabilities or chronic illnesses, altogether 157 in our survey, experienced more inappropriate behaviour from security staff, customer service personnel, and other festival employees, than other attendees. The in-depth interviews revealed various types of misconduct that persons with disabilities saw as ableism, and that festival employees had difficulty facing disability. Three universal themes were identified: lack of understanding, distrust, and hostility. Additionally, organizers’ actions were mostly addressing mobility impairments only. The results indicate that it is crucial to provide training to festival organizers and employees on disability issues. Furthermore, it is essential to have persons with disabilities among festival employees.